Sunday, November 26, 2006

Sunday Review

Last week, Joseph Cheshire and James Coleman testified before a state House committee on the issue of prosecutorial misconduct. Though the topic was confined to misconduct in death penalty cases, the duo’s remarks resonated for the lacrosse case.

Said Cheshire, “We do know that prosecutorial misconduct exists . . . We all want to believe the fiction that all of our elected district attorneys are ethical. There are gross exceptions to the good people on both sides.”

Coleman, meanwhile, criticized the “unprincipled exercise of discretion” in seeking the death penalty, which disproportionately targets minorities.

It’s not hard to think of a district attorney who is a “gross exception” to the pattern of ethical occupants of the office; or who has distinguished himself for the “unprincipled exercise of discretion.”

---------

Defenders of the academic status quo often dismiss those who criticize higher education’s lack of intellectual diversity by contending that even if humanities and social sciences professors are overwhelmingly one-sided, students are discerning enough to detect their bias and not be indoctrinated. The case of Shadee Malaklou, however, would seem like Exhibit A for the critics’ case.

In a recent op-ed that Duke Basketball Report correctly termed McCarthyite, Malaklou contended that despite Nifong’s prosecutorial misconduct, his handling of the lacrosse case is “right,” because lacrosse players need to be punished for unrelated behavior of which she disapproved.

At Duke, Malaklou is a dual major in cultural anthropology and women’s studies, two departments known as hotbeds of anti-lacrosse activism. Cultural anthropology is home to such figures as Orin Starn, among the team’s leading critics. The women’s studies program, meanwhile, features on its homepage Karla Holloway’s “Bodies of Evidence” opus.

The two departments are among only three in which more than 50 percent of faculty members signed the Group of 88’s statement. A staggering eighty percent of the African-American Studies 2005-2006 faculty members signed the statement, followed by Women'sStudies (72.2 percent) and Cultural Anthropology (60.0 percent).

The Group of 88, of course, might suggest that professors in the hard sciences—or in Economics or Slavic Studies—aren’t as concerned as are statement signatories with issues of underlying racism in American society. Perhaps, but it is it far more likely that these faculty members recognized the inappropriateness of professors rushing to judgment and publicly denouncing their students based on wildly incomplete information.

No professors in the EngineeringSchool signed the statement; no full-time law professors signed it, either.

--------

Duke Basketball Report recently published a thoughtful commentary by ’05 graduate Adam Bonneau. Bonneau noted that the basics of the lacrosse case are now clear: “In the months since the night in question more evidence has, in fact, come to light, and virtually all of that evidence suggests that no rape occurred and that the players are innocent. Almost everyone – including most of those who initially assumed otherwise – agrees that the case is without merit, and the only holdouts are those who probably will not change their position unless the accuser fully recants her story.” (My guess is that some Nifong enablers would cling to their position regardless.)

But, cautioned Bonneau, a danger exists in allowing the lacrosse case “to call into question the plausibility of gang rape stories in general.” He cited the rape-and-murder by U.S. soldiers in Mahmoudiya, Iraq, to argue that “the lacrosse case should not compel anyone to assume innocence in the future, just as the Mahmoudiya case should not compel anyone to assume guilt. Instead, the two cases together should remind everyone of the importance of withholding judgment until all of the relevant facts have come to light.”

Feminist groups, it seems to me, particularly need to ponder Bonneau’s message. Susan Estrich stands as among the few high-profile feminists who have criticized Mike Nifong’s handling of the case. Estrich blasted the “minister of justice” for overriding procedures to take the case to trial: as she noted, such a fraudulent action will leave all true victims’ rights advocates “depressed because we will worry, rightly, about all the messages being sent to legitimate victims.”

As Estrich recognized, by approaching the lacrosse and Mahmoudiya cases as one and the same, anti-rape activists will only lead fair-minded people to doubt their cause in the future.

---------

The Nifong lineup is now the conventional wisdom for a rigged procedure. Straight Dope is a well-reviewed website dealing with cultural trivia. The site recently ran a piece on eyewitness lineups; here's how it characterized actions by the “minister of justice”:

Sometimes law enforcement officials ignore sound advice, to say nothing of common sense, when putting together a lineup. Perhaps Mike Nifong, district attorney for Durham county, North Carolina, and Durham police sergeant Mark Gottlieb were watching The Usual Suspects instead of reading the DOJ guidelines. Defense attorneys allege that a woman accusing members of the Duke University lacrosse team of sexually assaulting her was shown photos of … the Duke University lacrosse team. There were, in other words, no “fillers” at all – every picture she was shown, according to the defense lawyer, portrayed a team member. Not surprisingly, the woman picked three members of the team as her attackers.

---------

For good or ill, the fates of any number of people are tied to the disposition of this case. The most obvious, of course, is Nifong, whose pending ethics case before the state bar would be immeasurably strengthened by somehow getting to trial and achieving a hung jury. But two other figures come to mind as well: Bob Ashley, who has chosen to transform the Herald-Sun into a Nifong cheerleading arm; and Richard Brodhead, who has remained silent as Nifong has imposed a “separate-but-equal” legal system on Duke students and Duke students alone.

Unlike Nifong, who desperately needs a trial for his self-preservation, the fate of Ashley and Brodhead will depend more on financial matters. Ashley’s Kentucky-based bosses must be watching with alarm the plunge in H-S subscriptions since Ashley started serving as Nifong’s minister of propaganda; and it seems hard to believe that limiting his paper’s potential readership to the 49 percent who cast ballots for the “minister of justice” is a sound long-term business strategy. Meanwhile, Brodhead needs to sustain the Duke fundraising base in the face of increasing alumni questions as to why and how his administration has accepted Nifong’s “separate-but-equal” system while helping the Group of 88 assume de facto campus leadership.

Along these lines, Glenn Nick, a former lacrosse player who graduated from Duke in 2006, recently offered an incisive comment to those considering donating this year to Duke.

Though a letter to designate that a contribution be used for, say, Pratt (Engineering) or the athletics department (explaining why) sounds great at first glance, there is a glaring problem with this tactic. No matter where and how money is designated to Duke, President Brodhead and company will still possess the benefit of tallying this amount to their overall alumni contributions, thus painting his tenure as lucrative for the University.

Much of a president’s success is strictly measured by dollars, therefore I beg all interested to write your letters to the powers that be every time a donation request is mailed to you, but rethink where to send the check.

The defense fund for the indicted players and their families is a drop in their legal fees’ bucket. Please consider this donation alternative; it will serve the greater good for Duke by eventually shedding light on the University’s mismanagement of the rape hoax, ultimately holding the enablers responsible by weeding them out.

Nick, of course, is correct—for partisans on both sides of the issue. Those who wish to keep in place what the New York Post’s Abby Wisse Schacter recently termed Duke’s “presidential spinelessness” should boost their contributions to Duke this year.

Board of Trustees chairman Bob Steel is a vehement Brodhead partisan, but other members of the Board doubtless would notice a dramatic spike or plunge in donations, and respond accordingly.

---------

This week’s Wilmington Journal, the paper that runs Cash Michaels’ columns, has a contribution from Nifong citizens’ committee co-chair Kim Brummell. Brummell, who has described herself alternatively as a “corporate security officer” and a part-time employee for FedEx, is best-known for championing the use of DNA to exonerate innocent defendants—when the defendant happens to be a “black man.”

Brummell’s column alleges “a double standard for African-American victims receiving media coverage,” in which the media devoted disproportionate attention to the lacrosse case because it involved an allegation of a white-on-black crime. This line of critique might very well be true—but it seems rather odd coming from Mike Nifong’s citizens’ committee co-chair. Without the media attention that Brummell now denounces, Nifong almost certainly would have lost the primary.

That the “minister of justice” himself fanned the attention with inflammatory and misleading arguments makes Brummell’s current position seem even stranger. I’m sure that Brummell and other Nifong enablers wish outsiders would stop paying attention to events in Durham now that the “minister of justice” has achieved his goal. But it’s more than a little hypocritical to describe as racist media attention that Nifong, in violation of the state bar’s ethics rules, stoked for his political gain.

38 comments:

OT but worth a mention. I recieved the information via Liestopppers. I reviewed the search warrants and the "non testimony warrant". I have never heard of such a thing but I guess N. carolina is living in a different age.My point being that any state can make their own rules as long as they do not conflict with the US Laws. That is why their are appeals courts. So where does Nifong get a warrant for 40 plus people to give DNA samples? Is this creative on his part and will it pass muster by the courts?

I have no idea how a court of any type can issue a warrant with no probable cause WHATSOEVER and attach a list of people for DNA tests. Even in Nifong country there has to exist PC for each and every person. Nifong was just lazy and should have issued separate waarants for each person. This sounds like the photo line ups situation. What is going on in N. Carolina and why isn't the Federal and/or State Gov. stepping into this fiasco? The judge has to be in on this for the scenario to work for Nifong.Overall the information provided in the two warrants lend no credibility to Nifong's case no matter how he presents it. The Investigator has an entire three years on the job and apparently hasn't learned very much in that time. Mayberry! maybe! Nifong is stuck with the written affidavits for these warrants and they are very revealing.

If you look at Duke Women's Studies' "Affiliated Faculty" list, you get a better picture of who signed the 'Listening Statement.' That list appears to be the common denominator for most faculty who signed the document. Perhaps, the marching orders were coming from there to all affiliated faculty.

Joseph McCarthy's name has been thorougly vilified by Hollywood and the MSM. Not only that, he was completely broken as a person, drank heavily, and died of liver complications due to alcohol at the age of 48 thanks to that vilification. He was an American who tried to ferret out communists and Soviet spies from the government. There is tremendous evidence after the release of Venona that McCarthy was indeed correct in his assertion that communist spies were infiltrating high levels of government. His only error was that even he UNDERestimated the extent.

So I respectfully ask that we try to learn from this case and not propogate lies or inaccuracies which certainly includes the use of "McCarthyism" as a meaning of false and zealous attacks on innocents. Sorry to be off topic, though this is an important point to me after reading about McCarthy and all the evidence that vindicated him. It also placed a tremendous bad taste in my mouth about the mendacity of Hollywood and the MSM. Thanks.

Your accounting by department of Duke faculty who have or have not publicly commented on the case omitted the largest group of Duke faculty. I have not heard anyone on the medical campus take a public stand though my informal impression is that the majority there ascribe to the "that's a crock" version of events.

The testimony demonstrates that people who say "just let things go to trial" are without capacity for critical thinking. In North Carolina (as in many other states) black defendants are executed at a greater rate than white defendants and, additionally, some counties produce a disproportionate amount of executions.

While this is a complicated subject (some counties have a higher crime rate, explaining the greater number of death penalty cases) but is at least worth thinking about. Ironically, of course, it is the poor minority defendant who is the likely victim. Of great resonance for this case is that in almost all cases the defendant facing the death penalty is, by all standard measure, a bad person, involved with gangs, or a bad criminal record, or a murderer. If the answer was 1) let any prosecutor condemn anyone they want to death and 2) let's avert our eyes if they are guilty of bad behavior, then the fate of the wrongly accussed would be of little importance.

In fact, as Professor Coleman's testimony indicates, and as I previously posted, many people have been thinking about these subjects for a long time and the idea that bad behavior and prosecutorial discretion is the answer to wrongful convictions is dated and dangerous.

As a proud member of the Straight Dope Message Boards, I must protest your characterization of the Straight Dope as a website devoted to cultural trivia. The mission of the Straight Dope, as put forth by Cecil Adams, the worlds smartest human being, is to fight ignorance; it has been doing so for thirty three years now.

I meant cultural trivia in the positive sense of the term :) I see now that didn't come out the way I wanted it to--meant to say that the site was devoted to facts and explanations about a whole range of issues.

On ethics: It is my understanding that at least one and perhaps more ethics complaints have been filed against Nifong.

The fact that the Senators, Congressman and Assemblymen are becoming involved in this case shows that this country will not stand for corruption from public officals. Nifong's actions and the deception of the DPD has sickened to many people to go unnoticed. He has dirtied our Constitution and we want a good cleaning starting with the cesspool of corruption in NC. Continue to write to the Department of Justice, Raleigh FBI, NC Bar and Attorney General. Let them know we want Nifong and the DPD held accountable for their actions.

Maybe nifong will not let this end until he gets his salary ranged properly to retire. it is usually based on an average of X number of years times the percentage. He can drag this out for about another year and then put his papers in. nothing will happen and he keeps his pension. The DOJ and State's AG have to act quickly if they want to actually do anything to Nifong. It sure doesn't seem that way. If they really wanted to get involved they can take over the case(special Pros.) and indict Nifong at the same time. It doesn't matter wether he actually did anything wrong. just make an example of him like he is doing to the LAX THREE.

I think it takes a lot of gall for Glenn Nick, a member of the Duke lacrosse team last year, to be urging people to withhold contributions from Duke on the ground that this is the best way to stick it to President Brodhead, as if Brodhead were the one responsible for creating this mess. I have a couple of questions for you, Glenn. First, what was your role in this debacle? Did you attend the party? Did you make the broom stick comment? Did you shout racial epithets at the two women? If not, do you know you did? If you do, maybe you could identify them for us because they certainly deserve far more criticism than Brodhead. Or do you prefer to circle the wagons and protect your guilty teammates while deflecting all criticism to Brodhead so that you and your teammates can avoid responsibility for what you did and get Brodhead to take the fall? Also, were you on scholarship at Duke? Are the guys who made the broom stick comment and shouted the racial epithets still on scholarship? If so, I would say that your position of taking money from Duke while urging others to withhold money from Duke so that you can stick it to a guy who basically got sandbagged by the irresponsible behavior of you and your teammates makes you look like a real jerk and as someone who apparently is too stupid to understand the idiocy of what you are doing. I would suggest that you just crawl back into a hole someplace and try not to compound the damage that you have already done to your alma mater.

I am proud of Glenn Nick to speak out. He was there, so what. Lets remember...nothing happened. Crude remark by ONE player...no excuse...however...the racial slurs...NEVER happened...read what is out there..One comment..."Thank your daddy...again NOT excusable but the 'N' word was NEVER spoken.WITNESSES to that!!I for one think the suggestion to donate to the defence fund is a great one. Most certainly Duke did not get a dime this year from our family. They had a obligation to defend their students, not attack them without knowing the facts FIRST.Thank you Glenn...

I have some sympathy with the viewpoint expressed by anonymous 1:03am. If I found out that my 20-y.o. son had attended a Stripper-themed party at college, I'd be appalled, and there would be a serious and angry discussion to follow. What does this say about his view of women? Has he bought into the Hook-Up campus culture? Does he see sex as a commodity? Does he lack the good sense and judgement needed to distinguish good clean fun from playing with fire?

If my son had organized such a party, I would be outraged.

Yeah, I'm old-fashioned. Maybe anonymous 1:03am is, too.

If that was the beginning and end of it, the discussion about the Administration's role in the Lacrosse Rape Hoax would be about the vagaries of the University's in loco parentis role for students who have reached the age of majority, and the University's disciplinary writ over off-campus activities.

It looks like these discussions are seriously overdue at Duke, and other places. For instance, it appears that the lacrosse team was hardly the only group to view hosting strippers as ordinary party entertainment.

That's not the focus of most discussions concerning Duke's institutional performance in the Lacrosse Rape Hoax. That is because of the troubling record that the Brodhead Administration has accumulated. An accounting would include:

-- Administration silence on false and malicious characterizations of the case by D.A. Nifong in March and April.

-- Administration advice to lacrosse team members to not seek counsel and not inform their parents of an ongoing police investigation, with them as subjects.

-- The Administration acceding to a Durham/DPD policy of unequally harsh treatment of Duke students for misdemeanor offenses.

-- Administration indifference to D.A. Nifong's jettisoning of Due Process (in contrast to Brodhead's role in the case of the Duke grad student arrested in Armenia).

Anonymous 1:03am doesn't seem to like seeing these elements spotlighted. They are quite apart from the instances of crass behavior by many lacrosse team members. The Brodhead Administration appears to have abandoned principle in favor of expediency. For that, they fully deserve the brickbats being thrown their way.

A separate point in favor of Glenn Nick is that he posted under his own name, rather than anonymously.

My posted comments were simply suggestions for individuals who wished to modify their monetary gifts to Duke in reaction to the University’s response to the rape hoax thus far. It was a clear and factual proposal one could adopt or not. Your anonymous post, on the other hand, was a non-factual attack composed with biased, hateful language. I find it ironic that you, as an anonymous poster, have now twice suggested that I “crawl into a hole.”

There is nothing nonfactual about my 1:03 AM comment. The comment contains a series of pointed questions, which I notice you have failed to answer. If you do not like the tone of my questions, that is too bad. I do not like what you and your teammates have done to hurt Duke. I also do not like the fact that you and your teammates are trying to demonize Brodhead while ignoring or minimizing your own irresponsible behavior. The fact is that there are several current and former members of the LAX team who deserve far more criticism than Brodhead, including the captains of the team who organized the party, the guy who made the broom stick comment, the guys who shouted the racial epithets, and Ryan McFayden who sent the disgusting email. In light of this, I have nothing but contempt for someone who would engage in the self-serving exercise of urging people to stick it to Brodhead while simultaneously concealing the identities of his guilty teammates. I have an idea. Instead of focusing solely on Brodhead, maybe KC should write some big feature articles which put the words and actions of the LAX players under a microscope. For example, maybe he could write an article which examines all of the things the LAX players have done over the last couple of years to tick off the people in Trinity Park. Then, he could write another article which focuses on those LAX players who have been arrested over the past couple of years and why they were arrested. Then, he could write an article which dissects what each and every LAX player did and said at the party on March 13, identifies the player who made the broom stick comment and the players who shouted the racial epithets, and holds the players accountable for what they did. Then, maybe he could ask some tough questions, such as why in the world should Duke continue to pay scholarship money to kids who have done so much damage to the university. This way, we could have a more fair and balanced discussion which focuses on all aspects of the LAX case, instead of a biased and one-sided discussion which just pounds away on Brodhead while giving the LAX players a pass. As for the fact that I am posting my comments anonymously, so what? The vast majority of people who post comments on this web site post anonymously. What I want to know is when are you going to answer the questions posed in my 1:03 AM comment?

let's get real for a second: the most despicable person in the lax fiasco is crystal mangum, an underclass predator who would prefer slandering innocent peole than take responsibility for public intoxication

There are no blameless parties associated with this hoax--that includes Brodhead and the lax team. But the real villains are the AV and Nifong, and there is a tendency to put too much blame on other parties.

To the 1:03 poster--While I agree with your sentiment that the lax players have much to apologize for, I cannot support the degree to which you blame them. Yes, whoever made racist comments and the player who made the broomstick comment should come forward and apologize, loudly, to the university and the community. I believe the "broomstick" name is known and he is a VERY good player--is that why he is silent? But while the lax team's conduct was far from acceptable, the real blame for the situation belongs with the AV and Nifong. No matter what the lax team did, it does not justify false allegations of rape, and it is those allegations that have torn the community apart and harmed the university's reputation.

While I think there have been mistakes made by Brodhead, there are many who continue to twist his words to try to make him the villain in this case. From day one he has urged people to withhold their judgment. His recent comments to the NAACP were not new--I have heard him many times--last spring and this fall--repeat the same consistent message--innocent until proven guilty and that the evidence calls into question the allegations. It is legitimate to question the university's position regarding the DPD's treatment of Duke students, as well as the university's apparent silence about Nifong's ethical violations, but to blame Brodhead for this mess is just as wrong as blaming the team.

To Glenn Nick--You certainly have every right to direct your donation. But if others follow suit and as a result the university has to cut back on lax scholarships (or other athletic or academic scholarships), is that the outcome you would desire? Did you receive scholarship money from Duke, and do you think that your conduct (and that of your scholarship teammates) was appropriate given the assistance you/they received? Do you think the players bear ANY responsibility for the situation, or is it easier to blame Brodhead?

most intelligent americans now realize that crystal mangum's lies r at the heart of this case--the "harm" to duke's reputation is the extent to which the affirmative incompetents have come to symbolize duke, and guess what? that's duke's fault--these affirmative action parasites would bring down the rep of any elite school, and these parasites r on all "elite" campuses

I wrote earlier that I would be outraged if my son organized a stripper party at college. Here are actions that I would label as yet worse:

-- Mocking a homeless person on the street for their misfortune;

-- Taunting convalescing soldiers returned from Iraq for their combat injuries;

-- Slandering a former student with baseless charges of poor classroom conduct.

I think most readers would be similarly distressed if they realized that loved ones had engaged in such behavior. But how many readers would find it acceptable if a D.A. pursued an indictment on a fabricated felony charge (say, rape) after such an occasion?

Who would comment, "That's justice!" or "They deserved it!"?

Anyone? Bueller? How about you, anonymous 1:03am/2:26pm?

There is a world of difference between legal-but-offensive behavior and felonious behavior. Reviewing anon's bill of particulars against the lacrosse team:

-- the captains of the team who organized the party. Crass but legal.

-- the guy who made the broom stick comment. Crass but legal. On 60 Minutes, exotic dancer Roberts stated that in the context of the 'show,' she thought the comment was not threatening.

-- the guys who shouted the racial epithets. Crass but legal. Again on 60 Minutes, Roberts acknowledged that these were in response to racial taunts that she had thrown.

-- Ryan McFayden who sent the disgusting email. A crude joke that was meant, and taken, as a play on raunchy material covered in the classroom.

-- all of the things the LAX players have done over the last couple of years to tick off the people in Trinity Park.

-- those LAX players who have been arrested over the past couple of years.

These latter two are too vague for me to try to characterize. My guess is that they concern misdemeanor public-order violations.

Why would this catalog of behaviors justify the Brodhead Administration's complaisant actions in response to D.A. Nifong's manifold violations of equal protection, due process, and proper police and prosecutorial conduct over the course of the Hoax? How would it justify the Administration's silence as members of the Duke community piled on with accusations reminiscent of Senator Joe McCarthy?

This defense of the derelict behavior of the Brodhead Administration seems to amount to a recitation of a few specific instances of lacrosse team boorishness. Further, it ignores the findings of the Administration-charged faculty committee that found the team's overall behavior, moral character, and academic performance to be excellent.

If Glenn Nick and KC and the other LAX team supporters are so hot to cut contributions to Duke, I think Duke should respond by eliminating all funding for the LAX program, including all scholarship money.

to 6:17--I agree. I understand some criticism of the way Duke has handled this--but hindsight is always 20/20. But I object to the attitude that the lacrosse players were the finest students, citizens, etc. And this notion that everyone should withhold their contributions--contributions which in the past have paid the tuitions of lacrosse players--is a little over the top for me. They're talking about withholding money that supports athletic and academic scholarships, extracurricular activities, undergraduate research....Withholding these dollars only hurts the students.

7:00 PM, do you seriously think that a significant portion of those who make gifts to Duke gives a damn whether Duke has a LAX program? When Bill and Melinda Gates gave the money for the French Science Center, do you think it was because they are big LAX fans? Also, I have not noticed Harvard or Yale suffering financially just because they do not have good LAX teams. You really are delusional. Moron.

To 7:01 -- If witholding contributions (and diverting them to the defense fund) ultimately results in a Duke administration which expects its faculty to be supportive (or at least neutral) towards their students falsely accused of crimes, as opposed to publicly vilifying them and encouraging those who persecute them, future Duke students will benefit overall. If it results in an administration less prone to hire faculty who despise those of their students who belong to a politically disfavored class (white, male, well-off), future Duke students will likewise benefit.

The comment by 8:40 PM is a great example of the one-dimensional thinking that permeates this web site. As Learned Hand pointed out in a comment posted a week or so ago, Brodhead was recruited by Duke because he is a proven leader who knows how to run a top notch university. However, in the one-dimensional world of KC and the LAX team supporters, if Brodhead does not loudly and publicly declare that the LAX players are innocent of rape, then he does not deserve to be president of Duke no matter what else he has done to benefit the university and no matter what else he might be capable of doing in the future. In other words, the LAX team supporters do not care what Brodhead is doing or might be able to do in the future to benefit your child, they only care about what he is doing to benefit the LAX players. Brilliant analysis guys.

Interesting that none of the professors in the Biology or Genetics department signed the statement. I suspect all of them are familiar with the concept of DNA as something more than just the guys who remixed a Suzanne Vega record.

Blog Awards

About Me

I am from Higgins Beach, in Scarborough, Maine, six miles south of Portland. After spending five years as track announcer at Scarborough Downs, I left to study fulltime in graduate school, where my advisor was Akira Iriye. I have a B.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard, and an M.A. from the University of Chicago. At Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center, I teach classes in 20th century US political, constitutional, and diplomatic history; in 2007-8, I was Fulbright Distinguished Chair for the Humanities at Tel Aviv University.

Book

Comments Policy

(1) Comments are moderated, but with the lightest of touches, to exclude only off-topic comments or obviously racist or similar remarks.

(2) My clearing a comment implies neither that I agree nor that I disagree with the comment. My opinion is expressed in my words and my words only. Since this blog has more than 1500 posts, and since I at least occasionally comment myself, the blog provides more than enough material for readers to discern my opinions.

(3) If a reader finds an offensive comment, I urge the reader to e-mail me; if the comment is offensive, I will gladly delete it.

(4) Commenters who either misrepresent their identity or who engage in obvious troll behavior will not have their comments cleared. Troll-like behavior includes, but is not limited to: repeatedly linking to off-topic sites; repeatedly asking questions that already have been answered; offering unsubstantiated remarks whose sole purpose appears to be inflaming other commenters.

"From the Scottsboro Boys to Clarence Gideon, some of the most memorable legal narratives have been tales of the wrongly accused. Now “Until Proven Innocent,” a new book about the false allegations of rape against three Duke lacrosse players, can join these galvanizing cautionary tales . . , Taylor and Johnson have made a gripping contribution to the literature of the wrongly accused. They remind us of the importance of constitutional checks on prosecutorial abuse. And they emphasize the lesson that Duke callously advised its own students to ignore: if you’re unjustly suspected of any crime, immediately call the best lawyer you can afford."--Jeffrey Rosen, New York Times Book Review